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CHAPTER V

VALETE

It was now definitely decided that Archibald Samphire must go into the Church, and in due time hold the snug family living. The Squire, however, was of the opinion that Her Majesty's scarlet would mightily become his handsome second son, whereas the black of a Clerk in Orders would do well enough for Mark. Archie, to his father's surprise, chose the sable instead of the gules. Amongst the Samphires it was a tradition that the second son always became a parson. Archie had a respect amounting to veneration for tradition.

"Suit yourselves," said the Squire of Pitt Hall to his sons. "I should have liked to have seen Archie on a charger."

"But what a leg for a gaiter," said Mark, hinting at episcopal honours.

Archibald was now a very big fellow indeed, so big that when he went in to bat at Lord's, as captain of the Harrow eleven, a small Eton boy, not far from Lord Randolph's coach, called out shrilly: "I say, Samphire, how's your wife and family?" This was the famous year when Eton was beaten by five wickets, having suffered defeat during four previous summers. And the only thing that marred Archie's triumph was the fact that Mark, despite the services of a professional during the Easter holidays, had not a place in his eleven. On the eve of the great match one vacancy remained to be filled. It became certain that either Mark or Jim Corrance would fill it. Jim has confessed since with shame that he was miserably jealous of Mark, that for a dreadful three weeks this feeling strained their friendship. And he knew that Mark was the better cricketer; more, that he had made his friend a better cricketer, that Jim's understanding of and skill in the game were due to Mark's precept and practice. Mark would whip a cricket-ball out of his pocket, whenever five minutes could be spared, crying, "Come on, old chap, you muffed an easy one yesterday—catch!" And the ball would whizz at Jim's toes. But during the last trial match Mark fainted from the heat, and Jim took his place in the slips. That night Archie sent for Jim.

"You can get your 'straw,'" he growled.

"But Mark——"

"Won't take it."

"Won't—take—it?"

"He's right. He hasn't the strength. He might faint at Lord's. We can't run any risks."

Jim went back to his room—confounded. Mark met him and gripped his hands.

"You've g-got it," he cried. "I am glad. Isn't it glorious?"

"Glorious?"

Jim sat down and blubbered, like a Fourth Form boy.

However, it seemed certain then that another year would place Mark in the eleven, and also amongst the monitors, but this happy end to his Harrow career was not to be. Archibald, Jim, and he left Billy's at the end of the Easter half. In those days it was hardly possible for a boy to pass into Sandhurst direct from a public school. Billy said that Mark could do it—at the expense of his health; for extra subjects, like geometrical drawing, English literature, history, and so forth, would have had to be learned in addition to the regular school work, which in the Upper Sixth was as stiff as it could be.

"I'm very sorry to lose you," said Billy, when the brothers bade him good-bye. "Samphire major's future I am not concerned about. But I do worry about you, Samphire minor, because you attempt too much, you—er—so to speak—strain at the camel and swallow the gnat. Well, well," he fumbled with his glasses, "I should like to give you the benefit of my experience, but," he pursed up his lips, "I am not sanguine enough to hope that you will profit by it. Some excellent people think I take my duties too lightly. Perhaps I do, per—haps I do. A big house like this represents a force against which one individual is expected to pit his strength. But I realised long ago that what energy I could spare must of necessity prove—er—intermittent, the undisciplined, amorphous resistance would be constant. You—er—take me? Yes. So I governed myself accordingly. The great force which I was invited to control sways hither and thither, veering now to the right, and now—er—to the wrong. The swing of the pendulum, in fine. When it swings to the right I push it, so it swings a little farther; and when it swings the other way I pull behind, and perhaps it does not swing quite so far; but I don't try to stop the swing, because I know that such a feat is beyond my powers. I trust you are following me, Samphire minor. You, I fear, will recklessly expose yourself—and be rolled over, as happened in our house-match against Bashan's. There—I have warned you."

He signed to Archibald to remain behind. For a moment there was silence. Billy leaned back in his chair polishing the lenses of his pince-nez with a fine cambric handkerchief.

"If Mark had your body," he began absently, then, faintly smiling, he added: "Ah, what possibilities lie in that 'if,' which it were vain, quite vain to consider. Well, I hope that nothing will come between you and him, that your brotherly love, which has been a pleasant thing to witness, will continue to grow in strength. Mark has an extravagant affection for you—the greater because he does not wear it on his sleeve. Your success here has sweetened the bitterness of his many disappointments. You will get more from him than you give."

Archibald felt his cheek beginning to burn.

"Don't distress yourself on that account," said Billy kindly; "only take what he gives, generously, and so you will best help him to play his part in life."

After this interview followed the farewell supper in the common-room, with its toasts and speeches. Archie made certain that he would break down in his speech. And before the fags! He could see and hear the heartless little beasts snickering! As captain of the eleven and of the Philathletic Club, he was expected to speak about games; as a monitor, it was no less a duty to mention work. Finally he wrote out his speech and submitted it to Mark.

"Just what they'll expect," Mark observed. "You j-j-jolly well crack 'em up, and then let 'em down a peg or two. You tell 'em what they know already—that Billy's is the best house in the school; and then you hope that it will remain so after you have left. No doubt without your moral and physical support, Billy's is likely to go to p-p-pot."

"You make me out an ass."

"Most Englishmen either grunt or bray when they get on to their legs to m-m-make a speech."

"And what are you going to say?"

"Nothing. Mum's the word for a stammerer. I shall bid 'em good-bye, that's all."

Thanks to Mark's criticism, Archie saw and seized an opportunity. He told the house he was convinced that its present prosperous condition was entirely due to his personal exertions, that he trembled for its future after he had left, that, if possible, he promised to run down from time to time for the purpose of giving advice to the Doctor, which he was sure would be appreciated—and so forth. Billy's roared with laughter, although the sneering voice of Nixon minimus was heard: "I say, he's trying to be funny!" When Archie sat down, the head of the house proposed Mark's health. The old common-room rocked with cheers. None doubted his popularity, but this deafening roar of applause lent it extraordinary significance, because such tributes were reserved for famous athletes, and for them alone.

"Thank you," he began; "thank you very much. I suppose you have believed all the p-pleasant things that the head of the house has just told you about me … " Here a dozen voices interrupted, "Yes, we do"; "He didn't lay it on thick enough"; "You're a beast to leave us," and the like. Mark continued, and in his voice there was a curious minor inflection which held attention and silence in thrall: "I am glad you believe them, although he has laid it on too thick. You see we can't get away from f-f-facts, can we? And the fact is I've been a f-f-failure." He paused. "I wanted to play in a cockhouse m-match at footer; I w-wanted to w-win a school race; and I w-w-wanted—by Jove! how b-badly I w-wanted that—I wanted my 'straw.'"

"It was offered him," said Archie.

"It was offered me," repeated Mark. "And if I'd taken it, it might have p-proved the straw which breaks the camel's back. Jim Corrance got it, and we know what back he broke—eh? The b-b-back of the Eton bowling." (A terrible din followed, during which Billy appeared, holding up a protesting hand: "My dear fellows, unless you are more careful you will destroy this ramshackle house!")

Meantime Mark had sat down, but every boy in Billy's respected his silence. He did not wish them good-bye, because he couldn't.

CHAPTER VI

AT BURLINGTON HOUSE

You may divide the world into those who pipe and those who dance. The pipers, for the most part, envy the dancers; but many a dancer has confessed that the piper, after all, has the best of it.

Mark and Jim Corrance, at this period of their lives, were dancers to lively measures. They lived at home for a year, emancipated youths, enjoying the pleasures of Arcadia. Three times a week they rode across the grey, green downs, "that melt and fade into the distant sky," into Westchester, where a scholar of repute undertook their preparation for Sandhurst. Other days they worked at home, not too hard, and played much tennis—a new game then—and practised arts which please country maidens, amongst whom Betty Kirtling was not. For the Admiral, having no stomach for immature Romeos, sent his niece abroad (in the company of Miss Hazelby) to Dresden and Lausanne, whence letters came describing queer foreign folk with sprightliness and humour, and always ending "your most affectionate—Betty."

As the months passed, Jim became aware how strenuously Mark's heart was set on a soldier's career. One night, for instance, the young fellows were dining with the Randolphs at Birr Wood, when a famous general was present. Mark confessed himself aflame to meet the hero; and the hero, when he met Mark, became interested in him. Who shall say there is not some subtle quality, undetected by the common herd, which reveals itself to genius, because it is part, and not the least part, of genius? And you will notice that if a great man be speaking in general company, his eyes will wander here and there in search of the kindred soul, and when that is found, they wander no more. On this occasion a chance remark led the talk to India. Lord Randolph regretted that so brilliant a soldier as Hodson should have slain the Taimur princes with his own hand. The hero, who had known Hodson intimately, said that the princes had been given no assurance that their lives would be spared, and that their escape would have proved an immeasurable calamity. As he went on to speak of Nicholson and the siege of Delhi, the buzz of prattle round the big table ceased.

"He suffered excruciating pain" (the general was alluding to Nicholson), "but not a complaint, not a sigh, leaked from his lips. During nine awful days of agony, his heroic mind fixed itself upon the needs of his country, to the very last he gave us sound and clear advice. When he died, the grim frontier chiefs, who had witnessed unmoved the most frightful atrocities, stood by his dead body with the tears streaming down their cheeks. … "

"What a man!" exclaimed Mark.

"Ay," said the general. He stared at Mark, and continued, giving details of what followed the fall of Delhi: then unpublished history. The speaker had marched with the column despatched to the relief of Cawnpore. "We could only spare," said he, "seven hundred and fifty British and one thousand nine hundred native soldiers, and—let me see—how many field-guns?" He paused with his eyes still on Mark.

"Sixteen field-guns," said Mark.

"Yes, you are right. Sixteen field-guns." Then as he realised from whom he had received this piece of information, he broke into an exclamation: "God bless me! How did you know that?"

"I've read the d-despatches," said Mark, blushing.

After dinner the general came up to Mark and asked him if he were going to be a soldier. On Mark's eager affirmative, he said deliberately: "When you are gazetted, my boy, come to see me. I'd like to make your better acquaintance."

For a week Mark could talk of nothing save the Indian Mutiny.

"You're too keen," said Jim. "Suppose we don't pass?"

"Not p-p-pass? That's a dead certainty."

"If we did not pass——"

"We could enlist, Jim. I say, you're not going into the Service because, b-b-because I am?"

"You lit the match," Jim admitted. "A fellow must do something. Soldiering's as good as anything else."

"Ten times as good as anything else," Mark exclaimed.

Jim nodded, sensible that Mark cast a glamour over the future. As a child Jim could never listen to tales of smuggling, of hidden treasure, of Captain Kidd and the Spanish Main, without feeling a titillation of the marrow. And now that he was eighteen, with fluff on his lip, Mark could provoke this agreeable sensation whenever he pleased. That he could fire Jim was not surprising, for Jim was tinder to many sparks, but he could fire Archibald also.

"I back you to win big stakes," he would say. "W-w-what did the gipsy predict? You will g-get what you want, because you want it so badly. You've a leg for a g-g-gaiter. And your voice, your v-voice is amazing. I'd sooner hear you sing r-rot than listen to Lord Randolph talking s-sense. You must have the best of singing lessons. Why—you'll charm the b-birds off the trees."

Archie did take lessons; and began to warble at many houses ballads such as "'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay," "Sally in our Alley," and "I saw from the Beach when the Morning was Shining." He grew bigger and stronger and handsomer every day, and Mark's pride in and affection for this splendid elder brother became something of a thorn in the side of his friend Jim. Mark had an ingenuous habit of putting wise words into the mouth of this Olympian. "Old Archie," he would observe, with a beaming face, "thinks so-and-so. … " Jim was sorely tempted to retort: "If old Archie thinks that, why the deuce doesn't he say it?" It was plain to Jim that Archie's brains were of a quality inferior to Mark's, but Mark would not allow this, and always waxed warm if anyone dared to speak slightingly of the colossus. Archie, for his part, returned his minor's affection, and not only sought for, but accepted graciously that minor's advice.

A year later Mark and Jim went up to London for the competitive examination, lodging at a family hotel in Down Street, an old-fashioned inn where the name of Samphire was known and respected. The Squire offered to accompany them, but Mark begged him to stay at Pitt Hall. Mark and Jim unpacked their traps, and then looked out of the window over the great world of London.

"Too much smoke for me," said Jim, seeing nothing but dun-coloured roofs and chimney-pots innumerable.

"But think of the f-f-fires," said Mark, "and of the faces round the fires. I am sure I should learn to like London, if it were not so beastly dirty. Why, there are smuts on my cuffs already."

They had a luncheon such as boys love: chops fizzing and sputtering from the gridiron, a couple of tankards of stout, a tart with Devonshire cream, and some Stilton cheese.

"Are you nervous?" said Mark.

Jim admitted a qualm or two.

"We ought to come out amongst the first twenty."

"If I am dead lag, I shall be jolly thankful," said Jim.

After lunch they took a turn down Piccadilly. Mark talked: "I say, what a glorious b-buzzing, like a swarm o' bees in June, and we're in the hive—eh?"

Presently they entered the Burlington Arcade, exchanging greetings with old school-fellows; some of them forlorn of countenance; others bubbling over with self-assurance. The Medical Board had to be passed that afternoon. Disjointed phrases flitted in and out of Mark's ear. "Not got a chance, I tell you, but it pleases my people to see me make an ass of myself—Fancy a rank outsider like that wanting to go into the Service—Yes; seventy-nine, not out—and first-class cricket—Who are those fellows with dirty collars?—If you try to crib and get nailed, you're done—Hullo, Samphire minor! you're going to pass in first, I know—I say, I saw your aunt the other day—What dead?—And a jolly good thing, too—One of the biggest duffers in the school, I tell you—With windgalls and an awful splint—Played for the 'Varsity—And, as luck 'd have it, he hit her favourite cat——"

Outside the Arcade, they shook themselves free of the chatterers.

"I am in a beastly funk," said Jim, as they went up the stairs of Burlington House.

"Funk of what?" Mark answered impatiently.

"I don't know," Jim muttered vaguely.

They entered a long, ill-lighted room, and waited their turn. Boy after boy came out grinning, and buttoning up coat and waistcoat.

"Rather a farce this medical exam," whispered Mark; and then, as he spoke, his voice broke into a stammer: "I s-s-say—w-w-who's this?"

A fellow they had known at Harrow was coming through the great double doors. His face was white as a sheet and his lips blue. He was hurrying by, when Mark called him by name.

"They won't have me," he gasped. "I—I thought I was all right," he added piteously, "but I ain't."

"What's wrong?" said Mark.

"Heart. I asked 'em to tell me. They were rather decent, but I'm done. If you don't mind, I'll hook it now. No, don't come with me. I'm not as bad as that. Only it will, it may—grow worse."

He shambled away with the step of an old man. Mark's face was working with sympathy.

"How b-b-beastly!" he said. "And it m-m-might be one of us."

They passed through the doors into a larger room beyond. Here a score or more boys in all stages of dressing and undressing were dotting the floor. Near the window a big, burly man was testing the sight of a slender, round-shouldered youth. "How many fingers do I hold up?" Jim heard him say; and the unhappy youth replied: "Three!" The big man laughed grimly. "Wrong. Come a little nearer, and try again."

Jim was confoundedly pale.

"Pinch your cheeks," Mark whispered.

They were told to strip, and did so, but waited for some time, while the wind from an open window blew cold on their bare backs.

"Let's slip on our coats," Jim suggested.

"The others don't do it," said Mark, glancing at a row of shivering boys, "and we won't."

After what seemed an interminable interval, Jim's name was called. The doctor into whose hands he fell made short work of him. He clapped a stethoscope to his chest and back, looked at his legs, asked a few questions, and smiled pleasantly. "If you can see and hear, you're all right," said he. "Next!" Jim went back to where his clothes lay in a heap on the chair. He knew that his sight and hearing were excellent; but why in the name of all that was hateful did not Mark come back? Half-way down the room Jim could see him, standing in front of a small, ferret-faced man, who was talking quickly. Now, Jim had not been asked to run round a table or to perform any other strange exercises, but Mark was treated less kindly. Jim saw him jump on and off a bench; then he began to run, and Jim caught the quick command: "Faster, sir, faster!" And then the stethoscope was laid upon his heaving chest. Jim watched the doctor's impassible face. Suddenly the doctor looked up and beckoned to the man who had examined Jim. The second doctor put his ear to the stethoscope.

"Catch him!" yelled Jim.

A hush fell upon the big room as Jim sprang forward, half clothed and choking with excitement. He had seen Mark quiver and reel, but the tall, thin doctor had seen it too. When Jim reached them, Mark was on his back on the big table. The ferret-faced man was smiling disagreeably, and tapping the palm of his hand with the end of his stethoscope.

"Absolutely unfit," Jim heard him say. "Not a surgeon in London would pass him."

"Not pass him?" Jim said furiously. "He's only fainted; he's done that before, that's nothing."

"Isn't it?" said the little man drily. Then he added malevolently: "When I am ready to receive instruction from you, young sir, I will let you know."

When they got back to the hotel and were alone, Mark flung himself into an armchair. Presently he said quietly: "Let's get seats for the play"; so they walked as far as Mitchell's in Bond Street, and bought two stalls for the Colleen Bawn, in which Dion Boucicault was acting. Then they strolled on to Regent's Park. Not a word was said about what passed in Burlington House till they were crossing Portland Place, where a cousin of Mark's had a house.

"I shan't go back to Pitt Hall till your exam is over," Mark said. "I'd sooner stop up here with you."

"I don't care a hang about the exam now," Jim blurted out.

"I know you don't," Mark replied. "All the same, you must do your level best."

This calmness surprised Jim. But after the play, as they were strolling home through the crowded, gas-lit streets, Mark whispered fiercely: "I'd like to get drunk to-night."

"Let's do it," said Jim.

"Good old chap! Do you think I'd let you do it?" He glanced at a handsome roysterer, who was reeling by on the arm of a girl as reckless-looking as her companion. "I can guess how they feel, poor devils!"

"We'll have a nightcap, anyhow," said Jim.

So they turned into one of the Piccadilly bars, full of men and women, and ablaze with light reflected from a thousand glasses and mirrors. Mark had never set foot in a London bar at midnight. The roar of the voices, interpenetrated by the shrill laughter of the women, the clinking of glasses, the swish of silk petticoats, the white glare, the overpowering odours of the liquors and perfumes, the atmosphere hot on one's cheek—these smote him. Yet the sensation of violence was not unpleasant. He was sensible that he might yell if he liked, and that no one would heed him. They edged up to the bar, squeezing through the mob till they were opposite a young woman whose plain black dress and immaculate apron were crowned by a mop of chestnut hair.

"Why it's—it's Squeak," Jim said to Mark.

She recognised them at once.

"Hullo, Mr. Samphire minor—why ain't you in bed?"

They demanded whiskies and sodas.

"You can tell that 'andsome brother of yours that I'm here," said Squeak, as she pushed the drinks across the bar.

"I'll mention it to him," said Mark.

"I want to see him, to thank him. He got me this job. Don't worry! I mean that if I'd not got the chuck from Brown's I shouldn't be 'ere, but there. I've not seen 'im. He's one of the kind that loves and runs away."

She laughed shrilly, staring with angry eyes at the young men. Her complexion had lost its freshness and delicacy; her eyes were no longer clear and bright. Mark's impassive face exasperated her.

"Tell 'im to send back all the 'air I gave 'im," she continued viciously.

"You have not quite so much left," said Mark.

"Don't look at me like that, you kid, you! I know you're thinking," she spoke very low, bending across the bar, "that I'm not any younger, or prettier, or better be'aved. Well—I ain't. And that's why I want to thank your brother."

"I shall not forget to tell him to come to see you. It will be safe enough—now."

They dropped back into the crowd. By this time Mark was able to take note of his surroundings. Squeak, so to speak, had given him bearings. The faces, in relation to hers, had a certain resemblance, as if those present belonged to the same family. Next to Jim stood an obese Israelite, puffy of face, with thick, red lips shining through an oily, black beard. Jim felt a mad impulse to kick him on the shins. Beside him was a tall, thin youth of the type known in the seventies as the la-di-da young man. His pallid, clean-shaven face, his light-blue eyes, his closely cropped flaxen hair, his delicate features were all in striking contrast to the Jew's gross, corpulent person. The hands of each were as different as could be: the Jew's short and thick, and none too clean, with a couple of big yellow diamonds blazing on them; the youth's long and thin, very white and bony, with polished nails. And yet the pair were as twins, for the same evil spirit leered out of their eyes.

"Come on," said Mark.

Outside the air was delightfully fresh and cool, but the crowd seemed to have thickened. A tremendous human tide ebbed and flowed between the tall, dark houses. Jim's eye caught a white feather in the hat of a girl, which tossed like foam upon troubled waters. Suddenly the fascination of the scene gripped him. This was London—London, the city of millions; and he stood on the pavement of its most famous thoroughfare, of it and in it, whether he loved it, feared it, or hated it. And at the moment, so overpowering was the sense of something new and strange and terrible that he could not determine whether his feeling for the capital of the world was one of attraction or repulsion.

Mark and he moved slowly on, till they came to the wall which encompasses Devonshire House. At the corner stood a huge policeman, grimly impassive, one of London's hundred thousand warders, and an epitome of all.

"When is closing time?" said Mark to the constable.

"Quarter-past twelve, sir."

Mark looked at his watch.

"Five minutes more. I'm going back."

"Where?"

"To that girl—Squeak."

"What on earth for?"

"I spoke brutally. I shall beg her p-pardon. Don't come with me!"

"You're as mad as a hatter."

Jim went on to Down Street, ascended the stairs, and began to undress, thinking of two things which obliterated all others—the slender figure of Mark when it reeled back into the arms of the tall, thin surgeon, and the white feather wavering hither and thither above the turbulent crowd.

Half an hour passed, and Mark did not return. Jim grew apprehensive. If Mark had fainted—if he had fallen into coarse, gross hands such as those of the Jew. Then he thought of the colossus at the corner of Devonshire House, and took comfort in him—the Argus-eyed, the omnipresent and omnipotent.

"Not in bed yet?" said Mark.

"By Jove, here you are! I saw you trampled under foot."

"I'm glad I went back. The girl's a good sort—silly, vain, terribly ignorant, but not without heart. I promised to see her again. It wouldn't be a b-bad bit of work to get her out of that—hell."

"You're a rum 'un," said Jim, for since they had parted Mark's face had resumed its natural expression—that look of joyousness which redeemed the harsh features and sallow skin.

"A rum 'un—why?"

"Well, I supposed, you know, that you'd be thinking just now of—of yourself."

"I'm rather s-sick of that subject."

He flung off his clothes and turned out the gas. Jim slipped into bed in the adjoining room. He couldn't sleep for an hour or two, wondering whether Mark would break down when he found himself alone, listening with ears attuned to catch the lightest sigh. To his astonishment, Mark breathed quietly and regularly. He must be—asleep! Jim waited for another ten minutes; then he slipped out of bed. The moon was throwing a soft radiance upon Mark's figure. He lay flat on his back, with his arms straight at his side. He was smiling! But his fists were clenched, and the jaw below the parted lips stood out firm, square, and aggressive. …

Jim watched him lying thus for several minutes; then he stole back to bed—no longer a boy, but a man. By many, doubtless, the step between boyhood and manhood is taken at random, and forgotten as soon as taken; or it escapes observation altogether. But Jim was shown, as in a vision, the past and the future: the green playing-fields, the happy lanes of childhood, and beyond—the hurly-burly, the high winds and whirling dust-clouds, the inexorable struggle for and of Life!

CHAPTER VII

THE HUNT BALL

At Harrow, Mark had been told by the drawing-master that he had great talent as a draughtsman, and possibly something more. The vague "something more" kindled possibilities which smouldered, and burst into flame when the doctors at Burlington House pronounced him unfit to serve his sovereign. The Squire suggested the Bar, a bank, or a junior partnership in a brewery. Mark shook his head. Briefs—supposing they came to him—bullion, beer, left fancy cold. But to paint a great picture, to interpret by means of colour a message vital to the world, this indeed would be worth while!

Mrs. Samphire bleated dismay and displeasure; but much to the Squire's surprise, Lady Randolph sustained Mark's choice of art as an avenue to success.

"Fame's temple," she said, "lies in the heart of a maze to which converge a thousand paths—most of 'em blind alleys. Mark may try one path after another, but in the end—in the end, mind you—he will choose the right one."

After a few months' work in South Kensington, Mark went to Paris, where he became a pupil of the famous Saphir at the École des Beaux Arts. Saphir looked at his studies and shook his head. He was of opinion that Mark had better join Julian's for a year; the standard at the Beaux Arts was very high. Mark showed his disappointment.

"Oh, monsieur, I am so anxious to be under you."

"Have you no better reason than that?" said the great man.

"Our n-n-names are alike," stammered Mark.

"Tiens! Any reason is better than none. Samphire et Saphir."

"And the l-l-less," said Mark, "includes the g-g-greater."

Saphir laughed at the compliment, and told Mark he might join his atelier. "Only you must work—work—work. That is my first word to you—work!"

Mark worked furiously. Many well-informed persons believe that an art student's life in Paris (particularly that part of Paris which lies on the left bank of the Seine) is a sort of carnival—a procession up and down the Boul' Mich', varied by frequent excursions to the Moulin Rouge and other places of entertainment in Montmartre. Of the unremitting labour, of the grinding poverty, of the self-denial cheerfully confronted by the greater number, an adequate idea perhaps may be gleaned from Zola's L'OEuvre, which sets forth, photographically and pathologically, French art life as it is. L'OEuvre, however, deals with the struggle for supremacy between the academic and the "plein air" schools. When Mark entered the Beaux Arts, this struggle, although not at an end, had become equalised, the balance of power and popularity lying rather with the plein air party, of which Saphir was the bright particular star. Saphir introduced Mark to Pynsent, then considered one of the rising men. Born in the East of America, related on his mother's side to two of the Brook Farm celebrities, Pynsent had renounced a promising career as a lawyer in the hope of making his fortune out West. In California he lost what money he possessed trying to develop a "salted mine." Then he "taught school" for bread and butter—a foothill school on the slopes of the Santa Lucia mountains, where the pupils were the children of squatters, and "Pikers," and greasers. Here he found his true vocation. For a couple of years he denied himself the commonest comforts, living on beans for the most part, saving his pitiful salary. Then he worked his passage round the Horn in a sailing-ship, and began at thirty years of age to draw from plaster casts! Since, he had taken most of the prizes open to foreigners at the École des Beaux Arts!

Pynsent found Mark a lodging and studio in the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie, not far from the famous Café Procope, the café of Voltaire and Verlaine. With Pynsent as guide, he learned to know Paris—the Paris of the Valois and Bourbon, the Paris of the Terror, of the Empire, and of the Republic. Pynsent had a prodigious memory, and an absorbing passion for colour. He was always hopeful, generous, proud, inordinately ambitious, and willing to sacrifice everything to his art. He exercised an enormous influence upon Mark, making plain to him the virtue which underlies so much that is vile and vicious on the surface.

"Men fail here," said he, "not so much from incapacity as ignorance. I could not interpret Paris to you or to myself had I not served my apprenticeship in California. Because my energies were misdirected there, I have learned to direct them here. Great Cæsar's ghost! What mistakes I have made! But you can bet your life that the fellow who makes no mistakes is either a parasite or a jelly-fish. Tell me what a man's mistakes are, and I'll tell you what he is."

"Am I making a mistake?" said Mark.

He had worked—furiously, as has been said—for two years. Pynsent smoked his cigarette for a full minute before he replied: "I don't know yet. I shall know soon."

"When you do know, tell me," said Mark.

Meanwhile Archibald Samphire was occupying a corner of that famous quadrangle of Trinity College where Byron, Newton, Macaulay—and how many more?—have kept their terms. Archie was considered by impartial judges to be a distinguished young man. A "double blue," he represented his University at cricket and as a runner; he was certain to take a good degree; he could sing charmingly; he was handsome as Narcissus. At the end of the second year's work in Paris, Mark and Archie and Jim Corrance made a tour of France, with the intention of visiting the Gothic cathedrals; but, as a rule, after the dust and glare of the French roads, both Archie and Jim Corrance would seek and find some cool café. Mark, however, would hurry off to the nearest church, and return raving of foliations and triforia and clerestories—empty words to Philistines, but to him documents of surpassing interest. Archibald was going to take Orders, not swerving by a hand's breadth from his goal; but Jim, after a year at Sandhurst, had resigned his commission.

"I'm no soldier," he told Mark. "I went up for my exam because you fired me. I want to make money—a big pile." Mark said nothing, but he thought of Betty Kirtling, now eighteen, and still abroad. Jim had mentioned (with a flushed cheek) that Betty was coming out at the Westchester Hunt Ball, always held in New Year's week, and Mark had said that he would assist at that and other festivities.

When Christmas came Mark crossed the Channel. He brought Pynsent with him as a guest. Mark was now twenty-two, but he looked older. You must imagine a long, thin, sallow face, illumined by two splendid blue eyes and a wide mouth filled with white even teeth. The hair was dark brown, and the eyebrows were arched, like the eyebrows of the poet Shelley. His nose was too long—so Pynsent said—and the chin was too prominent, the eyes set too far apart, the brow too wide. For the rest the figure was tall and slight, with finely shaped extremities. Curiously enough, although ninety-nine out of a hundred persons would have pronounced Mark an ugly man; yet, dressed in petticoats, judiciously painted and bewigged, he made a captivating woman. At a dance in one of the studios, he impersonated an American heiress with so much spirit and appreciation of the attention he received, that before the night was out he had promised to become the wife of an impoverished French count: a prank provoking a challenge, which Mark accepted and which doubtless would have ended in a duel, had not Pynsent explained to the victim of the joke that if Mark was killed, the slayer of so popular a person would have to fight his friends, man by man, till not one Englishman or American was left alive in Saphir's studio. "It is the woman in Mark's face," said Pynsent, "which gives it charm and quality; but the man, strong and ardent, looks out of his eyes."

Mark did not meet Betty till the night of the Hunt Ball. He was standing beside Archie and Pynsent, as she entered the room.

"Great Scott—here's Beatrice Cenci!" said Pynsent.

The artist was thinking of the fascinating portrait which hangs in the Barberini Palace, not of the wooden counterfeit presentment so familiar to buyers of cheap chromo-lithographs.

"It's our Betty," said Archie.

"As if it could be anybody else," Mark added.

Betty advanced, tall and slim and pale: her great hazel eyes sparkling with pleasure and excitement. Beside her, beaming with pride, walked the grey-headed, grey-bearded Admiral; behind came two nice-looking youths, fingering their highly glazed Programmes and gazing at the milk-white neck and shoulders in front of them. The big room was full of people: men in the "pink" of four hunts, officers in scarlet, officers in dark green and silver, dignitaries of the Church, bland and superior; lesser luminaries, such as canons and archdeacons; masters from the college, supercilious gentlemen for the most part, and the sisters and wives and cousins of these. A roving eye might detect the difference between those of the county and those of the town, dividing the latter again into those of the barracks, the close, and the college; and a stranger might have whiled away the evening, even if he did not dance, by noting the subtler distinction between the wife of a rural dean and the mistress of a country vicarage, or between Lady Randolph, the wife of the Lord-Lieutenant, and Lady Bellowes, whose husband was a baronet of recent creation.

The first dance had just come to an end, so the floor was comparatively clear for the passage of Betty and her squires. Archibald went forward, smiling, to greet her, followed by Mark and Jim Corrance.

"I've saved three dances apiece for you," said Betty.

One of the young men behind, Lord Kirtling's eldest son, protested loudly: "Oh, I say—and I'm a cousin."

"A cousin!" cried Betty gaily. "Why, these are my best and oldest friends. We've sucked the same acidulated drop."

Mark introduced Pynsent. Then Lord Randolph came up; and Betty was escorted in triumph to the corner sacred to the magnates, where her card was almost torn in pieces by the young men.

"Never saw such a pair," said Pynsent to Mark, indicating Archie and Betty.

Archibald, in the scarlet coat with white facings of the Quest Hunt, was standing beside Betty, who wore a pearly brocade embroidered with true lovers' knots.

"Dear old Archie looks splendid," said Mark.

A set of lancers was being formed. Mrs. Samphire, discovering that Mark had no partner, begged him to sit down beside her. The years which had passed since she married the Squire had turned her from a thin, prim, slightly acidulous spinster into a plump, smirking matron, whose skin seemed too tight for her face, even as her bodice seemed too tight for her figure. A voluble talker, she was never known to listen to any person save her superior in position or rank. Lady Randolph's lightest words she cherished and generally repeated them afterwards—as her own.

"I've hardly had time to say anything to you," she bleated. "How well Archibald looks to-night! It distresses me dreadfully to think that he will never wear pink again. Betty is very handsome. What do you say? A beauty? No, no. I can't agree with you. And I always admire blondes. All the Lambs are blondes."

"No black sheep in your family?" said Mark. Lady Randolph, who was near, smiled.

"Black sheep? Never! Dear me! Who is that? Oh, Harry Kirtling. What a nice-looking young fellow! One guesses why he is here. Our dear Admiral is anxious to see a coronet on his niece's head. Don't move, Mark! Ah! there is Lady Valence and her blind husband. Do tell me—I am so short-sighted—who is that very common young man with them? What? Oh, oh, indeed! The Duke of Brecon! I must say a word to dear Lady Valence."

She bustled across the room. Mark turned to Lady Randolph.

"Have you any m-m-mint s-sauce? There is s-something about all the Lambs which——"

"Does not bring out our great qualities," said Lady Randolph. "See! She has put the Duke to rout, and he is going to take refuge with me."

Mark glanced up, noting that the Duke's feet were flat and turned out at an absurd angle, giving him a shuffling and awkward gait.

"He is a better fellow than he looks," whispered Lady Randolph.

"Will you do me a favour, Lady Randolph?" The Duke's voice was very pleasant. "Perhaps you can guess the nature of it?"

"An introduction to Miss Kirtling, of course."

"Of course," he repeated, laughing.

The lancers was just over, and across the room Mark could see Betty and Pynsent deep in conversation. Pynsent, he had heard women say, was a fascinating man, the more so because heretofore he had been proof against the assaults of the fair. Hullo! Lady Randolph was crossing the floor with her Duke—confound him! And now Betty was smiling at him. Yes, he had secured a dance; somebody else's probably. What an insufferable silly grin he had! Jim Corrance interrupted his thoughts.

"I say, Mark—isn't Betty a wonder?"

Jim began to rave about her. The Duke and Lady Randolph passed on; Betty leant back in her chair, while Pynsent talked. It seemed to Mark that Pynsent was making the effort of his life.

"I'm glad you brought Pynsent from Paris," Jim was saying. "It will do him good. Like all Americans who live in Paris, he is ignorant of the best side of English life. Eventually he must settle in London. And he'll paint the portraits of all the swells. He tells me that already he's in love with——"

"Betty!" exclaimed Mark.

"With my mother," said Jim, grinning.

Mark was dancing the next valse, and had to seek his partner, who—it is to be feared—did not find him as agreeable as usual. Moreover, she too prattled of Betty, of the great match she ought to make, and so forth. Fortunately a polka gave an opportunity of letting off steam. After that, and a cooling glass of cup, Mark felt more hopeful and in better humour. Indeed, by the time his dance with Betty was due, he was himself, and beginning to enjoy the ball.

"Your friend, Mr. Pynsent, is perfectly delightful," began Betty.

"I thought you found him so."

Betty smiled demurely.

"He talked in the most interesting way about——"

"Himself," said Mark.

"No."

"About you?"

"Wrong again! He talked, nearly all the time, about a dear friend of mine whom I had not seen for years."

"I suppose you have dear friends in every town in Europe," said Mark.

The shameless coquette nodded. How her eyes sparkled.

"And who is this dear friend Pynsent knows?"

"Mr. Pynsent was talking about—you," said Betty.

"Betty, dear, forgive me! I am an ass, a silly, jealous ass. And seeing you to-night I—I——"

A kind pair of eyes warned him to say no more. For a moment there was silence. Then—they fell to talking of the old days, capping stories, and laughing at ancient jokes. When Mark left her in the hands of her next partner, he was more in love than ever, and knew that Betty knew it, and that the knowledge was not displeasing to her. And she had made plain, without words, that this meeting of friends had stirred her to the core, quickening all those generous emotions of childhood which older people are constrained sorrowfully to stifle and destroy. While Mark was sitting beside her he realised how little she had changed from the girl who had played truant on the Westchester Downs, and yet between them lay a blackthorn fence of convention and tradition.

Meantime he danced gaily every dance, and at the end of the ball got into a dogcart to drive home with Pynsent, feeling, perhaps, more alive than he had ever felt before. Pynsent offered him a cigar, and lighted one himself.

"This Hunt Ball has been a new experience," Pynsent said, as the cart rolled up the High Street. "And it means work. Lady Randolph has commissioned a portrait. I go on to Birr Wood after leaving you."

"If you satisfy her, Pynsent, she can help you enormously. She knows all the right people."

He heard Pynsent's pleasant chuckle.

"'The right people.' I always scoffed at that phrase. But I found out what it means to-night. Well, I hope to satisfy Lady Randolph. What I see I can paint. I wonder if Miss Kirtling would sit. Would you ask her?"

"Can you see her?"

"The finer lines are blurred. I might fail on that account. It would be no small thing to set on canvas the 'unexpectedness' of her face. She's going to surprise all of you before she's many years older."

"She will marry a swell and become like everybody else," said Mark nervously.

"A marriage of convenience! That would indeed be surprising. No, no; she is likely to marry the wrong man, but not from any ignoble motive; she is capable of a great passion, which, mind you, is more physical than mental, nine times out of ten. I'd like to make a study of her for a head of Juliet, but I should want her to be thinking of Romeo, who, I take it, has not yet made her acquaintance."

Mark shuffled uneasily, and began to drive a willing horse too fast.

"My brother, Archie, will sit as Romeo."

"Ah! When they were standing together to-night, somehow I thought of Verona at once."

"Pynsent," said Mark desperately, "I may as well tell you that I—I l-l-love Betty Kirtling. I loved her when she was a b-baby. I loved her when she was a g-girl. And it all came back to-night. There never has been anyone else."

"Um," said Pynsent.

"Tell me frankly what's in your m-mind."

"I'm trying to fit you into it—as Romeo."

"I'm an imbecile, of course, but I f-feel like Romeo. There—it's out."

"So is your cigar. Take a pull on yourself, man, and on that horse, too! You're not an imbecile. Alps lie between you and Miss Kirtling, but the Alps have been scaled before and will be again."

"If I could paint a great picture——"

Pynsent was silent.

Mark continued keenly: "And I feel in all my bones that I shall get there, as you put it—with both feet. I say—you're not very encouraging."

"You must try for this next Salon."

No more was said. But when Mark found himself alone in the room at Pitt Hall which he always used, he lit the candles on each side of the old-fashioned mirror. Then he examined himself, frowning.

"Romeo!" he exclaimed disgustedly. "Good heavens!"